First Date
by DukeGirl2001
Summary: They've finally made it to the first date, but date doesn't seem like quite the right word, right? So Red has the whole evening planned but Liz has other thoughts. What will happen when Liz pulls Red out of his comfort zone. Work in progress. Enjoy!
1. Chapter 1

"Reddington," she says, her green eyes dancing in the low light. She walks slowly across the carpeted hotel room floor and stops immediately in front of him. "Reddington," she says again and the tone of her voice implies humor, that she's laughing at his expense, but her eyes are kind, and he feels his face relax into a smile.

It is good to see her. Always. In the most unexpected of ways.

She reaches towards him and takes his hand, pulling it up from his side and holding it in her own.

Her skin caresses his, and the softness of it, the perfection, causes his chest to expand and his fingers tighten around hers involuntarily.

Holding on. Letting go. All the same, really.

His eyes dart to the door, ever wary of unplanned situations, and seeing nothing, return to her face.

"I promise," she says.

And he knows what she means. The implication there without the words. She will protect him. The man who holds all the cards, the power, the upper edge…he's falling, and she knows it. Holding his hand in hers.

"Come on," she furthers, and leads him towards the door, the golden evening light pouring into the hallway and out into the world.

He walks beside her, his black leather dress shoes padding quietly along the maroon carpet alongside her casually clad feet. He had dressed up for this night. Worn his finest suit and starched shirt. Shaved twice for good measure. Forgotten his cufflinks and then found and attached them.

His nerves were evident even to himself, but he chose to ignore them.

He hasn't asked where they are going. She expected the question as soon as she arrived in his room. Her jeans and knit shirt standing in sharp contrast to his formal attire.

It is all part of her plan. To throw him a bit. Shake the walls down and move him out of his carefully planned, meticulously constructed comfort zone. Away from the single malts and driven cars. The pretense. The game.

But she's still surprised he hasn't asked.

She tightens her fingers around his own.

He trusts her.

When they reach the elevator bank she presses the button for the ground floor and he raises his eyebrows in question, but no words leave his lips.

She sees the fight in him. The intrigue of the unknown coupled with the fear of not being in the lead. Of knowing all the plays before they are made.

"I drove," she says simply. Her car is down below. Parked tidily between an Aston Martin and a Tesla. As out of place here as she is.

As he is, perhaps. Really.

The elevator arrives with a bing and the doors slide open noiselessly. He steps aside, his hand not leaving hers, and silently indicates that she should enter first, but she doesn't. Waits for him to go ahead. And then she follows him in, pressing the stop button.

"Reddington," she says. And he looks down at her in the pale fluorescent light and her heart catches just a bit. His eyes are so kind, so true. "You aren't going to need this where we are going," she continues and she reaches up to push his suit jacket back from his shoulders.

Her hands are gentle as she pulls the last of the sleeves away from his white shirt, and she folds the jacket neatly over her arm. She reaches up then, tips up on her toes to loosen his tie, and lord in heaven; he braces himself to not react. To this girl, to the elevator, to all her fingertips ghosting across the tender skin of his neck.

He sucks in a breath and covers it with a cough and she smiles. Not a smirk but a smile and he knows that she knows, and it seems as if the entire deck of cards that he is holding is going down. Falling, falling.

She tugs the tie free, drapes it neatly across the jacket and then slides up beside him before deactivating the elevator stop.

Runs her hand around his back and leans. Just slightly. Just enough. Into him.

We're the next stop she whispers and he waits for the lights to tick down to G.

The smell of wet concrete permeates the air as they step out of the elevator lobby into the garage. She's walking in front of him now, hand still wrapped around his own, and he scans the rows for her familiar vehicle, exhaling as he finds it a third of the way back.

She hasn't said anything since the elevator, and the silence, the space, allows for him to reflect on this recent change of events. Instead of caviar and fine wine, instead of a carefully, meticulously planned evening, there is this void. This unknown.

He feels lighter somehow.

"Reddington," she says and he turns towards her as she stands beside the vehicle. "It's going to be good, ok?" And that smile on her face, that light in her eyes, it does things to him. Forces the wall down and he can breathe.

After a moment he realizes that she is waiting and he responds with a quick smile and reaches for the door handle.

It can't help but be good…if it's with her.

She keeps the smile on her face as she slips into the drivers seat, slides the key into the ignition, and sets her arm behind the passenger seat as she turns to reverse out of the space. His profile runs through her line of vision as she turns to look out the rear of the car and she pauses, putting the car back in park, and leans over. Brushes her lips against the softness of his cheek and lingers.

He can't breathe. He can't _breathe_. "Lizzie," he says, his voice so deep even he has a hard time processing it. Recognizing it as his own. And his word came out as a question but it's really an answer, to life, love, everything really.

He inhales and closes his eyes as she moves away. Places the car back in gear, and moves smoothly through the deck into the evening.

They drive in silence, the distance from the hotel, from his constructed life, increasing with every minute and he feels weightless as they drive pass restaurants and neon billboards.

It feels right here.

She turns off the road at the sign to the city park. The entrance well lit even in the evening hours. A steady stream of taillights trails down the hill and she maneuvers the car deftly into the gravel lot.

He raises his brows at her in question and she shrugs, her dimples deepening when she smiles.

"A concert?" he says, and it seems like a question but really he's just happy to be here. Anywhere, with her.

"Symphony in the park," she explains, and he nods. Transfixed by the way she looks at him. By the way she's looking at him. And he reaches across the car to take her hand. Holds it in his and smiles.

"Perfect," he says, and he means it. In every possible way. And he turns to open his door.

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

"Ready?" she asks, looking straight into his eyes, the leather console the only thing between them. Her eyes twinkle and her grin deepens such that dimples appear on each side of her mouth. Not that he's watching her mouth. He's watching her eyes, listening to her words, following her hands – God, he's thrown by all of this.

"Sure," he says, trying to sound nonchalant, like he rides in her car with her all the time. Attends concerts with her all the time. Just another day, right? Maybe the pretense of calm is working, except for the tremor in his hands, the heat he feels at the base of his neck, and dammit all, he's sure she can see it, detect it, because she's still looking right at him and she's smiling even more.

"Yes," he says with a swallow and he reaches down to grasp the door handle. It's sort of more than 'yes, he's ready to get out'. 'Yes, he's ready to stand up and go wherever it is that they are going'. It's a 'yes…' to something he can't quite figure out but he can tell that she gets the significance because her eyes soften and she leans over and briefly runs places her hands on his bare forearm. "It's going to be fine," she says. And it's clear she sees right through his bullshit.

It might never be fine again, he thinks as he rises from the car.

He's so preoccupied with his own inner monologue that she makes it over to his side of the vehicle before he even starts to move and then he feels her take his larger hand in her smaller one and, oh, her skin feels soft against his.

He's forgotten how soft feels. Tender, strong, and soft.

She leads him away from the row of cars towards the path and he becomes aware, all of a sudden, that there are other people there. Other people carrying chairs and coolers and jackets and they are all walking the same path and the other people aren't giving Liz and Red any notice.

And that makes him smile, the anonymity of it all. The hiding in plain sight with her.

He's nervous - she thinks as she walks along, his hand in hers. He's letting her lead and she knows, she _knows_, he wants to ask. Where are they going? What are they doing? But he doesn't.

He trusts her._ Her_. And she squeezes his hand.

She feels his fingers release her own and she momentarily misses the familiar warmth and then she feels the weight of his arm settle around her shoulders. Pulling her hip against the side of his thigh and they keep on walking.

She looks up into his face and he smiles and it seems like it's sort of a question. A 'is this ok?' kind of smile so she smiles back and says "yes."

And what is this evening turning into?

They haven't even defined what this night is. She just wanted to knock him out of his comfort zone for awhile. Take him away from the place where he had to be Raymond Reddington. Take him to a place where he could just be a man. With a girl. With her.

He had asked her to dinner earlier in the day, and what with everything that had happened, it seemed the right thing to say yes. So she had. And here they were. _Are_.

Together.

The path opens up into a vast field and he can see people strewn about on the grass, reclining on blankets and soaking in the night air. A small stage sits at the edge of the clearing and it appears that the musicians are setting up there. Their formal attire somehow mismatched with the casual atmosphere.

"They play outside a couple of times a year," she says, and it's like he said the question out loud. But he didn't.

She walks toward the right edge of the field and he follows, her body still pressed lightly against his, and he can feel the contraction that her muscles make with each step. He can feel it against his side, and what has he gotten himself into?

"Red," she says, and at first he thinks she's reading his mind again, but she isn't, just gestures at the ground, "is this ok?"

He nods and she spreads a faded quilt out over the ground and sits down Indian style to one side. She pats the ground beside her and he sits down just as the first few delicate notes float up the hill.

He might be dreaming.

She opens her backpack and pulls out a bottle of wine and two plastic cups and he feels his heart skip a beat as he reads the label. He gave her that bottle. It must have been months ago now. He said she should save it for a special occasion.

His eyes lift to her face but she is busy inserting the corkscrew, the green bottle held tight between her thighs.

He ducks his chin, the music and the significance of the moment flooding his senses, and breathes. How did he get so lucky?

She pours slowly, taking care not to splash, and sets the filled cup down on the blanket before reaching for the other. She's not sure what possessed her to bring this particular bottle of wine tonight, but when she opened the cabinet it was there and it seemed immediately like the only thing to do.

She hands his glass to him with a smile and sets back to take a sip of her own. Feels the liquid roll over her tongue and swallows before looking back up.

He's staring at her now, his eyes bright in the receding light.

"Thank you," he says, and the absolute sincerity in his voice forces the tone low and she watches his smile turn into a grimace and then alight again.

"For what," she says with a fluttery grin, her voice teasing.

And he moves across the blanket towards her, behind her, and pulls her back against his chest. Folds his arms around her own and whispers, his voice gravel and smoke against her earlobe, "for this," he says, and electricity runs down her spine and she forgets to breathe.

Below them, the music begins in earnest.


End file.
